GNGTS 2023 - Atti del 41° Convegno Nazionale

Session 3.1 GNGTS 2023 Gravity data analysis for the study of the mass temporal variations of the ice sheets caused by climate change. The case of Iceland (2002-2017) M. Maiolino, M. Fedi, G. Florio University of Naples “Federico II”, Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra dell’Ambiente e delle Risorse The study of the response of the cryosphere to climate change is fundamental for its contribution to sea levels rising. A huge improvement in the study of processes related to the mass variation of glaciers was determined by the gravity mission called GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment). This mission allowed us to map the changes in the Earth’s gravitational field over a period of about 15 years (2002-2017). In this note, we present an estimate of the mass change of Icelandic glaciers in the period 2002-2017. The estimation has been carried out using a methodology of inversion of potential fields called ECS ("Extremely Compact Sources") which has solved the problems related to leakage effects typical of GRACE dataset that are particularly visible in the area of investigation. The field related to Iceland is strongly influenced by the gravity field of Greenland. ECS allowed us to estimate mass changes without the use of independent data sets (ICEsat, Envisat) that are often used for the modelling of the effects related to nearby sources. In addition, attention has been given to the effects of an incorrect estimation of Glacial Isostatic Adjustment (GIA) phenomenon on the mass changes computation.